[palmer]

They hold a beam on target for 30 seconds while flying over, or circling? In any case a 10 second pulsed beam would probably be enough. A steady beam would not work (if that's indeed what the video shows) becuse it would create a plasma cloud that would heat up instead of the item the beam is supposed to melt.

My infra red laser EDMs shoot miles with hundredths of a watt of power.

Sure but it doesn't cut anything without 1000 Watts. The losses are mostly generating the beam, efficiency is typically less than 50%. My energy issue is not whether you can cut some steel or start a fire with your laser, I have no doubt you can do that. The issue is whether you can melt a wheel with a laser. You cannot without 250kW (times two because of losses) with time on target of 10 seconds. If you only have one second on target then you need a 5MW power supply. Not possible except with a giant transport aircraft.

The "evidence" of melted wheels does not support DEW. Not enough energy.

[editor-surveyor]

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The videos don’t show what the aircraft is doing, but in most cases the plasma track is visible for several seconds.

One of them that was shown on the local news showed a plasma track that had to be 1500 feet tall, and the idiots called it a “fire tornado.” (Tornados are cold core phenomina.)
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[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

Anybody that thinks the fires were started by military aircraft firing laser or particle beams are living in fantasy land. Let me get this straight: when a two-engine prop airliner is stolen up in Vancouver, WA by a goof non-pilot airline-worker, military F-15s are scrambled and are on the scene fast enough to witness the crash. The time from him taxiing to crash is like 8 minutes. But California, a state that is chock full of military bases with alert F-15s and F-16s, completely missed aircraft the size of the Hindenburg starting fires with their super-secret death-ray. I think we’ve hijacked the thread enough with this crap.